Worldwide Web draws us all closer

Russell has spent much of his life researching the lives of soldiers from the British Isles who fought in America under legendary Gen. George Custer.

What are the chances of a columnist getting email requests for help from authors on two different continents precisely one hour apart — and both of them turning out to have personal or family connections?

A million to one, I’d guess. But that’s what happened to me a few days back. For a few minutes there, I thought it was some new kind of Internet scam.

The messages came at 2:27 and 3:27 p.m. June 14, the first from Peter Russell of Bexleyheath, Kent, England. Russell has spent much of his life researching the lives of soldiers from the British Isles who fought in America under legendary Gen. George Custer.

Wrote Russell: “Dear Mr. McKeen, I’m not entirely sure if my ‘story’ falls within your remit, but if it doesn’t, perhaps you would be kind enough to pass it on. It concerns Timothy Donnelly, whose family lived in Spencer, Worcester County — even had a road named for them — who was killed with Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn, the 137th anniversary of which is on June 25. My biographical account solves the mystery of his place of birth in England and the year of his birth, both of which have been universally misrepresented until now.

“For this purpose, all the information one needs to know about Donnelly, who increased his age by three years on enlistment, can be found by following the link on my website, www.menwithcuster.co.uk … As you probably know already, Fort Abraham Lincoln, the 7th Cavalry’s HQ in 1876, was formerly named Fort McKeen, a tenuous link indeed but an interesting one for all that.”

Russell’s website invites readers from places such as Spencer to send along any information about Custer’s troops that they might have. As for Fort McKeen, who knew? Possibly my brother Bill, the family’s genealogist.

An hour later to the minute came this from Jonathan Eig, a bestselling author in New York whose biographies of Lou Gehrig, Jackie Robinson and Al Capone have been the talk of the writing trade for the last decade:

“Dear Mr. McKeen, I enjoyed your column on the tornado. You might be interested to know that it hit the same week as another historic event in Worcester. Katherine McCormick Dexter and Margaret Sanger visited Gregory Pincus at the Worcester Foundation of Experimental Biology on June 8, 1953, setting in motion the discovery of the birth control pill.

“I’m at work on a book on that subject. I’m trying to track down longtime Worcester and Shrewsbury residents who might have known the principal players. I’m especially interested in finding women who might have participated in some of the early experiments with progesterone. Dr. Henry Kirkendall was giving progesterone to some of his patients. So if any of his patients from 1953-55 are still around, I’d love to find them. I’ll be in Worcester July 1 to 3 and I’d be happy to arrange meetings with them in person.”

That held even more interest for me because I had attended a small liberal arts college with Dr. Pincus’ son John in the late 1940s and interviewed Dr. M.C. Chang — with the elder Pincus a pioneer in the development of the pill — in the ’50s.

Yes, it’s a small world all right, and with computer technology propelling us forward by leaps and bounds, it’s growing smaller almost by the minute.